An actual service manual intended for technicians who would be repairing the thing is likely to contain a lot more than the user manual would, although I have s

An actual service manual intended for technicians who would be repairing the thing is likely to contain a lot more than the user manual would, although I have seen schematics/board prints in both. Even without that available, stripping it of all components and running both sides through a high-res flatbed scanner works surprisingly well, although top-bottom alignment can be a bit of a bugger afterwards. (And wouldn't solve his problem with the gaping hole in the middle) And it doesn't work on >2 layer boards, obviously. That said, the part he ended up with didn't look too complex, and it's possible it might have been inferrable from either a schematic or by reversing the rest of the board to a schematic and making logical assumptions about what must connect where. Things like appropriate track sizing for the high power traces might be a bit more guesswork though. It's a fairly common technique in board reverse engineering, although usually you have a couple of sacrificial units, so you don't have to worry about putting all the damn SMD components back on afterwards :P